Taoyuan prosecutors raided BenQ Corp (
"Prosecutors raided BenQ's headquarters in Neihu (內湖), Taipei, as well as its factory in Taoyuan," Taoyuan District Prosecutors' Office spokesman John Chang (張進豐) told the Taipei Times yesterday.
Five prosecutors and dozens of agents from the Ministry of Justice's Investigation Bureau were involved in the search, he said.
PHOTO: CHANG CHIA-MING, TAIPEI TIMES
Chang said several accounting and financial employees were interviewed by investigators during the raid.
Chang said that prosecutors received documents from the Financial Supervisory Commission in December last year alleging that the company was involved in insider trading.
Chang said the company was suspected of trading between 6 million and 7 million BenQ shares just before it released its fourth-quarter earnings report for 2005 last March, which made public some negative information about the company.
BenQ posted NT$19.72 billion in losses, or NT$7.7 a share, for the first three quarters of last year, pulled down by the non-profitable European handset unit it acquired from Siemens AG a year ago.
To stem losses, BenQ decided to stop funding the European handset unit last September and filed for insolvency.
BenQ also planned to raise NT$10 billion to pay back debts by the end of the third quarter, which totaled NT$4 billion of the first half of last year, by selling its long-term investments and fixed assets.
Chang said yesterday that since the release of the report, BenQ shares fell from NT$35 to NT$14 per share yesterday. He said prosecutors might summon high-level BenQ officials if they discovered they were involved in the scandal.
BenQ yesterday admitted that investigators had raided its headquarters in Taipei and its office in Taoyuan but said documents were about its bonus practices for overseas employees.
"We have provided relevant documents to the investigative authorities and we will fully cooperate with any investigation," spokesman Eric Yu (游克用) said in a statement released after the raid.
BenQ has 20,000 employees worldwide, its Web site says.
"The investigation may add some additional downward pressure to the shares on top of existing concerns over their profitability," said Tony Tseng (曾省吾), who rates the stock "neutral" at Merrill Lynch & Co in Taipei. "It's hard to see if it will have any fundamental impact on the company."
Additional reporting by Bloomberg
Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密) is reportedly making another pass at Nissan Motor Co, as the Japanese automaker's tie-up with Honda Motor Co falls apart. Nissan shares rose as much as 6 percent after Taiwan’s Central News Agency reported that Hon Hai chairman Young Liu (劉揚偉) instructed former Nissan executive Jun Seki to connect with French carmaker Renault SA, which holds about 36 percent of Nissan’s stock. Hon Hai, the Taiwanese iPhone-maker also known as Foxconn Technology Group (富士康科技集團), was exploring an investment or buyout of Nissan last year, but backed off in December after the Japanese carmaker penned a deal
SUPPORT: The government said it would help firms deal with supply disruptions, after Trump signed orders imposing tariffs of 25 percent on imports from Canada and Mexico The government pledged to help companies with operations in Mexico, such as iPhone assembler Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密), also known as Foxconn Technology Group (富士康科技集團), shift production lines and investment if needed to deal with higher US tariffs. The Ministry of Economic Affairs yesterday announced measures to help local firms cope with the US tariff increases on Canada, Mexico, China and other potential areas. The ministry said that it would establish an investment and trade service center in the US to help Taiwanese firms assess the investment environment in different US states, plan supply chain relocation strategies and
WASHINGTON POLICY: Tariffs of 10 percent or more and other new costs are tipped to hit shipments of small parcels, cutting export growth by 1.3 percentage points The decision by US President Donald Trump to ban Chinese companies from using a US tariff loophole would hit tens of billions of dollars of trade and reduce China’s economic growth this year, according to new estimates by economists at Nomura Holdings Inc. According to Nomura’s estimates, last year companies such as Shein (希音) and PDD Holdings Inc’s (拼多多控股) Temu shipped US$46 billion of small parcels to the US to take advantage of the rule that allows items with a declared value under US$800 to enter the US tariff-free. Tariffs of 10 percent or more and other new costs would slash such
Three experts in the high technology industry have said that US President Donald Trump’s pledge to impose higher tariffs on Taiwanese semiconductors is part of an effort to force Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) to the negotiating table. In a speech to Republicans on Jan. 27, Trump said he intends to impose tariffs on Taiwan to bring chip production to the US. “The incentive is going to be they’re not going to want to pay a 25, 50 or even a 100 percent tax,” he said. Darson Chiu (邱達生), an economics professor at Taichung-based Tunghai University and director-general of
RSS